1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a recycle document feeder which is mounted on an image forming apparatus such as a copying machine, a facsimile machine, an image reader or the like, and adapted to feed a document original to be read by the image forming apparatus from a document placing plate to a reading position and then back onto the document placing plate after image reading of the document original.
2. Description of Related Art
A document feeder has been proposed which is to be mounted on a copying machine, for example, and designed such that a document original set on a document placing plate is automatically fed onto a contact glass of the copying machine and, after the document original is subjected to an image reading operation by the copying machine, a switch claw is switched either to feed the document original back onto the document feeding plate or to discharge the document original out of the feeder through a discharge port (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 1-187168 (1989).
Some prior-art document feeders have a document discharge portion covered with a discharge portion cover which can be opened, when a document transportation failure (e.g., document jam) occurs in a discharge path within the document discharge portion, so as to remove the jammed document from the discharge path.
Where a document feeder having a switch claw as disclosed in the aforesaid publication is provided with a discharge portion cover which openably covers a document discharge portion, however, the document discharge portion tends to have a complicated construction with an increased size.